nrd525 Market Tracker

[nrd525]

Hard fork coins: Bitcoin Gold, Bitcoin Diamond, and Super Bitcoin - at all time lows.  Notably Bitcoin Diamond down to $3.80.  I think I sold for $15+.

[TheQuin]

MtGox liquidator sells 30k BTC. Did they cause the recent crash?  I think we were overdue - but they probably added pressure.

I doubt it had any effect. From the wording in the official document, I think they probably sold it off over a period of several months in a number of OTC trades. It was 35k BTC @ an average price of $10,0026.92.

https://www.mtgox.com/img/pdf/20180307_report.pdf

"Between the 9th creditors’ meeting and this creditors’ meeting, with the permission
of the court, I sold a certain amount of BTC and bitcoin cash (“BCC”) that
belonged to the bankruptcy estate."

[nrd525]

If you want to have some fun, research Clif High and his "WebBot".  People pay for his predictions which include crypto currency as well as earthquakes.  His methodology may be anything from outright scamming to a convoluted pseudo-scientific method that is no better than astrology.

You can try to predict the bitcoin price using social media data (though not earthquakes!) - however he doesn't appear to know what he is doing and disguises everything with technobabble.

He has a significant following on YouTube.

He likes to pick very strange numbers for price targets.

[nrd525]

Trump wants to overheat the economy (he profits directly from a housing bubble).  But the Republican party (and Federal Reserve) might not let him.  Typical Republican tax cuts don't lead to strong economic growth as they target rich people and/or corporations - so they have a smaller impact on jobs and consumption.


"The Fed’s interest rate-setting body, the Federal Open Market Committee, said in a statement that it expects inflation to reach its 2 percent target “in the coming months.” The committee unanimously agreed to raise its main borrowing rate to between 1.5 percent and 1.75 percent, the first action taken under new Chairman Jerome Powell.

There is some good news for Trump. Fed officials upgraded their forecast for economic growth this year and next, projecting a 2.7 percent increase in GDP in 2018 and a 2.4 percent increase in 2019. But over the longer term, the central bank still expects growth to hover at or below 2 percent.

Trump is aiming for sustained annual GDP growth of 3 percent."

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/03/21/fed-raises-interest-rates-future-hikes-434469

I'm hoping bitcoin hits 3k (next 12 months), and then goes back to 10-50k (20-36 months) - allowing me to buy in and sell out before we get a recession.  Though I'm thinking the recession is 20-36 months away so the timing might be tight.  All of this with huge confidence intervals.

[nrd525]

>>So I'm shorting XRP, LTC, BTG, BCH, ETH, EOS, XMR, IOTA, and OMG on bitfinex.  Unfortunately only a total of 9k.  Up a lot (10% to 39%), but lost far more on my 5 >>remaining BTC.

>>Bitcoin dominance is at 36%.  It should hit at least 40% if not 45% - as we continue to bear down.


If I would have held this position I would have done a lot better on it.  As this mix of alt-coins has largely gone down after I sold them (and even with bitcoin up 15% since I closed this short).  Notably XRP which I closed part of my short position at 97 cents.  And how about that bitcoin dominance guess of 40-45%?

Of course day trading is for idiots (and people with insider information)!  I must resist the urge =)

I'm redoing my past taxes and drooling over all the bitcoins I cheaply bought (and regretting all the small trades that make my spreadsheet insanely complicated).

If anyone is on Bitfinex, we should do a campaign to get them to let you export 12 months of trading data!  If GDAX can do it, they should be able to as well.

...
Does anyone use the Trading View charting library? I'm integrating it with PredictIt.org data (political predictions website).  I could use some technical advice.  Also if you ever want to get into PredictIt - pm me.  Unfortunately I think the website has become increasingly difficult to make money as users have gained experienced and are pricing contracts relatively accurately.  Though I recently made an easy $45 on a pump of a worthless contract (someone pumped a Russian presidential candidate to 35 cents after all the votes were counted and they had lost second place by over 10% - as they has only got 1% of the votes).

I'm working on making data models for PredictIt to make money.

But it might be a lot easier to just buy bitcoin at 3k =)

[nrd525]

December 06, 2017, 06:34:46 AM
"We could see a big blow-off top around the time the CME goes through.  So December 18.  I've got no real idea, but something like a run at 15k or 20k followed by a crash to 7-9k would be along the lines of what is possible."



If you make enough predictions, you are likely to get one of them right!

[MNDan]

December 06, 2017, 06:34:46 AM
"We could see a big blow-off top around the time the CME goes through.  So December 18.  I've got no real idea, but something like a run at 15k or 20k followed by a crash to 7-9k would be along the lines of what is possible."



If you make enough predictions, you are likely to get one of them right!

Why didn't I listen?!?

[nrd525]

Placed some bids starting at 5200ish and going down from there.  It's looking bearish.

I realized recently that I might not be as well in tune with the level of despair as I actually want bitcoin to go down.  Whereas 2014-2015, I was buying on the way down starting at a much higher level ($600) and holding a considerable amount and had large (paper) capital losses.  Perhaps I've become too hardened and too accepting of the price dropping.

[nrd525]

If you have any BTC, I'd expect to see a good spike in the BTC lending rate at Bitfinex - as we go deeply bearish  (I'm hoping for a spike to 0.19%/day - though would settle for half that).    Unfortunately Poloniex rates suck.

Reviewing my past taxes, I've made a good number of BTC from lending.  There aren't many spikes, but they add up.

[nrd525]

A bunch of people have been getting hacked recently  (ex. see this very strange video from Philakone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bbbmdO1_mE, and also Tone Vays and Leah Wald Tyler got hacked -- though not as seriously).  I recommend using 2FA over SMS (as phone numbers can be stolen - transferred to another phone).  You might also consider a dedicated 2FA device (like a cheap mobile phone that isn't linked to your phone number, and that you are unlikely to lose -- or some kind of USB key like a Yubikey).


Tone Vays does a good 40 minute talk on the Tech Bubble - starting at around 4:30 in.  Q/A is more crypto related (and mostly generic if you follow his ideas).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2xMO3nnfnlo

[TheQuin]

Another alternative for 2FA is WinAuth https://winauth.github.io/winauth/
I find it more convenient as I only trade from my PC and you can also export your tokens to an encrypted file and print them out and make a backup. I've lost a lot more phones than I have PCs over the years.

[nrd525]

I asked the PA state about hard forks as they said use the stock-split method.

Apparently there are at least three methods
-other income (I used this one)
-stock splits
-zero accounting basis for the hard fork (though what happens if the coin flips and the other one becomes the main coin?)

Is there any free way to get federal IRS guidance on this issue?

If I have to use "stock splits" it severely impacts my tax planning for 2018 (as it shifts income from 2017 to 2018).

...

Interesting general trend.  Hard forks: Bitcoin Gold, Super Bitcoin, and Bitcoin Diamond are all decreasing versus Bitcoin.  Whereas Bitcoin Cash is holding its ground (so far).

BFX USD apr continues to suck: 2%.    The BTC rate occasionally spikes to 0.19%/day.

[Samarkand]

...
-zero accounting basis for the hard fork (though what happens if the coin flips and the other one becomes the main coin?)
...

Is there any example where something like this actually occurred?
If you look at the big hard forks like ETH Classic or Bitcoin Cash they have never
managed to actually become the main coin. I´m obviously not aware of all
the altcoin projects, so maybe there is a coin where a "flippening" actually
occurred.

I don´t think that governments around the world will address the issue of the
taxation of hard forks anytime soon. The trend of the Bitcoin hard forks that you mentioned
implies that people are increasingly aware of the fact that these attempts are likely
to fail anyway, which obviously decreases the incentives for people to engage in
new hard forks. I´d argue that governments are slow to act in general and will only
pass new tax laws when hard forks become a relevant issue.

[nrd525]

The Bitcoin Cash fork represents perhaps billions in capital gains (perhaps $10 billion total from a $300ish basis - and then whatever fraction of that has been sold).  That said, I am surprised that the PA state actually answered my question about it during tax season too.

Meanwhile - the ICO bubble continues. In four months, we've already exceeded the total ICO for 2017.
https://www.coindesk.com/6-3-billion-2018-ico-funding-already-outpaced-2017/

[nrd525]

I asked if I could count the hard fork as "other income" and got this response from a PA tax person:

"You must report it on schedule D as sale, exchange for disposition of property."

So I might be really screwed for taxes (if I exceed a certain income by $1 I pay $3500 extra).  One crazy solution is to actually intentionally lose money by trading.  For instance, I could lose a lot of money to fees by repeatedly buying and selling until I've acquired enough loss.  Is there any legal way to setup yourself for a loss (of around $3000) this year, that would lead to a gain next year?  I know rental property has depreciation - but I don't really want to buy any property now.

Could I buy two sets of options, one that would go up $3000 and another that goes down $3000 - and sell the options that go down $3000 this year and then cash the next set in next year?  I'm not sure whether this is even legal and if it is, how I'd structure it so that there'd be a relatively fixed return (I could lose 3k-5k, so long as I make it back next year -- but I don't want to lose more than that).

...

Bitcoin dominance 38.3%.  BTC 8500.  Looks like your typical bitcoin up / altcoins up even more scenario.  I still think 1k-5k is the bottom.  Might take a while.

[nrd525]

I sometimes forget a major use case for Bitcoin - entertainment - aka drama.

TheICOJournal blackmailing Philakone?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVAbP-owejI

https://theicojournal.com/

BCH is making quite the run.  Possibly because they are moving from 8 MB blocks to 32 MB ones (or someone decided to organize a pump surrounding this).

Tone Vays is acting more bearish than usual.  Recently claimed that all the traders (eg. probably a very small group of people who've been around since 2013 or earlier) he respected were bearish.

[Syke]

I asked if I could count the hard fork as "other income" and got this response from a PA tax person:

"You must report it on schedule D as sale, exchange for disposition of property."

By "it" do you mean the hard fork air drop qty or the hard fork coins that you've sold?

[nrd525]

Yes, I kind of wondered about that.  But I don't care too much about my PA method as the taxes don't change - unless it impacts my federal method.

And the first response was that I had to use the stock split method. So I see this second response as reinforcing that.  I expliclitly asked if another method was acceptable and they stuck with their position.

[nrd525]

BCH pump is due to the update (larger blocks and some other improvements) and also AntPool is burning 12% of the BCH they mine.  Which is hilarious.

As BTC pushes 9500, I'm thinking about how 1) I could be very wrong about this 3k bottom and 2) how thinking (1) also creates fake breakouts.

It does seem like we're far away from an ICO crackdown or an alt-coin break down.

On the plus side, BFX lending rates are finally going up (hitting 0.06%-0.09%/day).  They also sometimes have had better Euro, Yen, and GB Pound rates (back when USD rates were at 0.01%/day or less)  

[nrd525]

https://www.reddit.com/r/BitcoinMarkets/comments/8ftf80/simple_cash_carry_futures_arbitrage_calculator/
How big is the risk of Okex doing a claw back?


Also BFX USD swap rates spiking as high at 0.5%/day with FRR around 0.12%.